37 groups, 92 messages. :-|
On Nov 24, 6:21 pm, "Liz Purkrabek" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> http://www.afrochat.net/forums/politics-activism/20720-over-30-years-...
> despotism-america.html
>
> He's a chain poster.
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: [email protected]
>
> [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Morpheal
> Sent: Monday, November 24, 2008 7:49 PM
> To: Memphis Freethought Alliance
> Subject: OVER 30 YEARS OF RISING DESPOTISM IN AMERICA
>
> OVER 30 YEARS OF RISING DESPOTISM IN AMERICA
>
> A good leader always strives to make it possible for others to exceed
> the leader's own self, to the maximum of their abilities. This is as
> true in politics as it is in education. A good teacher always strives
> to have the students excel beyond the teacher's own abilities and
> knowledge.
>
> This is the opposite of despotism. Despotism strives instead to
> prevent anyone rising up and exceeding its leadership. Despotism is
> often clever in its using isolated instances, examples, that appear to
> excel, to evade criticism of what it is itself guilty of. That is the
> obstructing of excellence. A very few are chosen and made into
> examples, as if anyone can achieve the same, when in fact despotism
> stops all others dead in their every effort. That tokenism obscures
> the fact of despotism, and that despotism often remains undetected and
> unchallenged.
>
> The dangers of despotism in leadership, particularly prevalent in
> insecure leadership uncertain of itself, in any enterprise, in
> politics, wherever leadership is necessary, are a continual threat to
> real progress. It favors mediocrity, resignation to despair, and
> defeatism. It uses the modern psychological tricks represented by
> catch phrases such as "let it go", "finish" with it, and "give it up"
> as if that is the healthy choice. The very definition of health,
> under despotism, changes from favoring exceptional accomplishment to
> one favoring acceptance of defeat. The very meaning of realistic, and
> in touch with reality, changes. Wisdom becomes the wisdom of not
> trying to excel, and not trying to accomplish the exceptional,
> nurturing only the idea that it cannot be done, and that it is foolish
> to make the attempt. This becomes a socially engineered pattern,
> prevailing in society, under despotism. Psychology, social
> engineering, and medicine become the handmaidens of despotism.
>
> The human potential movement of the 1960s has largely perished, and
> what remains of it has been radically, albeit negatively, transformed.
> It has been constrained by despotism because it was a movement among
> the scientists applying the new psychological and sociological
> knowledge in a way that does not favor despotism. Despotism
> annihilated that movement as readily as it annihilated most of
> political activism and drove it completely underground. Even
> demonstrations under a despotic regime differ in character and purpose
> to those not constrained and manipulated by despotism, but again token
> protests and demonstrations are certainly part of the smoke and
> mirrors act that despotism so cleverly conceals itself behind. If you
> know the history, and are old enough to remember it, or have studied
> its largely discredited and banned writings, you know how it has
> changed. Those remaining radicals and activists, who knew the 1960s
> and early 1970s in America, know how it has changed and we must
> resurrect their voices, wisdom, and experience. Those who knew the
> human potential movement then, need to give voice to what happened to
> that incredibly insightful and powerful force for positive change.
> Those who knew the world of science and invention then, need to come
> forward as to how that too has changed, because the changes were not
> for the better. Despotism has prevailed in every area, and the truth
> has fallen victim to that despotism. Cultural workers, artists,
> playwrights, poets in particular, need to be heard as to what
> despotism has done to them.
>
> There is nothing right, moral or true about having the power to make
> others fail, to prove yourself right. That too is despotism. That is
> as true in the cultural sphere, as it is in the political sphere, and
> certainly in the economic sphere. Disguised as normal competition,
> despotism remains more often undiscerned and unchallenged. Despotism
> uses "competition", redefining it across a span of time, for its own
> purpose. When negative changes come across a longer span of time
> people fail to notice, fail to respond, and tend to accept, often
> failing to remember how it was. That failure is a tool of despotism.
> That is why despotism also favors ageism. The memories, wisdom,
> experiences, of elders are discredited in favor of youth. Despotism
> triumphs when its handmaidens of psychology and social engineering
> enforce ageist principles and destroy respect and consideration among
> youth for those who have been in this world long enough to know the
> difference between despotism and true human freedoms. Despotism
> triumphs among naive ignorance, not among experienced wisdom, but it
> knows how to silence and discredit that experience and wisdom. That is
> part of its weaponry of attack.
>
> Creativity , innovation, invention, social, economic, cultural,
> political, individual and particularly collective progress cannot
> truly and genuinely thrive under despotism. Despotism divides and
> conquers against collectivism enforcing a solipsist, narcisist, self
> involvement as the primary focus of the individual's cultural, and
> socio-political existence. This is also promoted as a new standard of
> health, and reflects in the cultural products and their means of
> production, most strongly. Often the problem of money is interposed as
> the rational for this phenomenon, but despotism knows how to decrease
> the means, increase the cost and put a price tag on everything, to
> prevent itself from being challenged by those who are trying to rise
> up, and to achieve. Alone they have little, or at best much less,
> chance. Collectivism is made too expensive. Cooperation is nearly
> unheard of. Only those chosen as examples, as tokens, and having more
> fiscal means, can buy that cooperation, and that too is part of the
> illusion that despotism hides behind. In the 1960s and early 1970s
> that was not how it was. There were far greater chances for
> cooperation and collectivism as an alternative without a high price
> imposed by despotism. Times have changed and despotism is counting its
> triumphs against humanity.
>
> Despotism also does something else worthy of note. It is often first
> to place an irrational idea, an unreasonable principle, that must be
> unquestioningly upheld, above all else. It often attempts to vindicate
> by a twisted, anxiety producing, highly conflicted, variant of
> religion. Its illegitimacy in that regard is scarce questioned because
> it requires immense expertise in order to discern the difference and
> to challenge what is happening. Despotism uses the powerful concepts
> of "spirituality", "faith", "belief", "trust", "grace", "salvation",
> and "god" in new ways, for its own political purpose. Despotism would
> have been considered the devil, but now it is a pretender to being god
> and that blasphemy, if you are religiously minded gradually tends to
> hold sway. Those concepts become the irrational justifications for all
> manner of despotic oppression, and are increasingly accepted by many,
> who lack the discernment. Again the expertise is coopted to being
> handmaidens of despotism. Psychology, sociology, social engineering,
> medicine, become coopted in support of the redefining of what we might
> term the "spiritual" dimension of life. The despotic destruction of
> other purposes, goals, achievements, attempts at succeeding, in any
> sphere of life become subordinated to a false spirituality, a false
> religion, which is made increasingly convincing of its "rightness".
> The very word "right" and "religion" become concatenated under
> despotism. The ability to question effectively and to act outside of
> that constraint of unquestioning irrational belief as a necessary,
> sometimes made into a sufficient, condition for imposed mediocrity to
> triumph, becomes completely destroyed under despotism. Even the
> experts are silenced on that subject. They are neither promoted, nor
> discussed openly. They are pushed down and ignored as being ignorant
> themselves, as a result of despotism.
>
> I myself studied the world's religions,.and its philosophies, eastern
> and western, more than 25 years ago, and I know how it has changed. I
> read the radicals, coming a little late, and having been a little too
> young in the latter half of the 1960s, but I remember the atmosphere,
> and what went on. I remember how things were done. I read the accounts
> of others. I know the difference.
> Later I witnessed the effects of the worsening Cold War, and the
> parallel rise of despotism in America, spilling over its borders, and
> changing my own country of Canada, and its socio-political
> environment, affecting its differing ideals, manipulating its culture,
> simply as the wake, the spillover wash, of an overwhelming flood of
> American despotism. We can scarce recognize ourselves, across the
> border from America, being so affected by its despotism. We watch the
> changes in America across a span of more than 30 years in largely
> silenced horror, and most have fallen victim to resigned despair and
> socio-political, even cultural, impotency in consequence of the tidal
> wave crossing the borders from America and spilling across the whole
> world. How much worse the effects of its own despotism, on America
> itself. We are the witnesses of that too. We, who have lived through
> that time, experienced it, and who remember the difference.
>
> Despotism has also persisted in using its failed economics, more often
> deliberately failed, also becoming a form of social engineering and
> manipulation, in shock waves of brutal ups and down cyclical economic
> apocalypses, timed to destroy progress, and beak it down,
>
> ...
>
> read more »- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
--~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups
"Memphis Freethought Alliance" group.
To post to this group, send email to [email protected]
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
For more options, visit this group at
http://groups.google.com/group/memphisfreethoughtalliance?hl=en
-~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
